black theater
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In Love and War: Jiréh Breon Holder’s Too Heavy for Your Pocket Weighs the Price of Freedom
It’s funny how the more things change, the more they say the same. Friday, May 17, marked 65 years to the day of the Brown v. the Board of Education ruling—a bittersweet anniversary, as civil and human rights continue to be rolled back across America and deep inequities for black and brown people persist with…
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Behind Picket Fences: In Sam Kebede’s EthiopianAmerica, the American Dream Masks a Common Nightmare
There is palpable energy prior to a theatrical production; a current of excitement that buzzes through an audience anticipating new work on the stage. At the press night for EthiopianAmerica, the newest production from the Chicago-based Definition Theatre Company staged at Victory Gardens, there was also a profound feeling of family, as several members of…
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Broadway’s Ain’t Too Proud Is a Rousing, Joyful Nod to Black American Life and Legacy
I have had the good fortune to have seen many a Broadway play (also quite a few off-Broadway, for that matter). But only a very few over the years have stayed with me—a short list would include Fela! The Mountaintop. Choir Boy. The House That Will Not Stand. Denzel Washington in Julius Caesar. The new Broadway musical Ain’t…
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Live to Tell: 25 Years After Genocide, Miracle in Rwanda Sheds Light on a Tragic Legacy
It’s been 25 years since the civil war that resulted in genocide against the Tutsi tribe of the East African nation of Rwanda. During a three-month period in 1994, as many as one million Rwandans were killed, including approximately 70 percent of the Tutsi population. Among those who lived to tell the massacre was Immaculée…
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Playing the Gentrification Game: In Ike Holter's Lottery Day, the Audience Wins
Gentrification continues to redistrict the boundaries of traditionally black and brown neighborhoods in urban cities across America—inevitably, pushing longtime residents and their stories to the fringes in favor of glossier, more palatable facades and narratives. Those stories have been the focus of playwright Ike Holter’s stunning seven-play “Rightlynd Saga,” focusing on the inhabitants of Chicago’s…
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Redefining the Role: LaTanya Richardson Jackson Finds a Well-Deserved Spotlight in Broadway's To Kill a Mockingbird
Many know her as one-half of one of Hollywood’s most enduring marriages, but LaTanya Richardson Jackson (wife of Samuel L. Jackson), is an acting powerhouse in her own right. Just ask the audiences currently experiencing her talent nightly in Broadway’s acclaimed production of To Kill a Mockingbird. Scripted by award-winning writer, producer and director Aaron…
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Stretching the Exquisite: Why Hearing Black Women’s Voices in Theater Is a Revolutionary Act
Big things were bubbling in Brooklyn two years ago. The year 2017 marked the 50th anniversary of Bedford-Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation, the first community development entity established in the United States. The nonprofit outfit has provided housing, employment, training and culture to residents of Bed-Stuy since 1967; 2017 was also the year the Restoration’s Billie Holiday…
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For Colored Girls, Forever: With a Stunning Revival and New Work, Ntozake Shange's Words Remain Timeless
“…bein alive & bein a woman & bein colored is a metaphysical dilemma/i haven’t conquered yet … my spirit is too ancient to understand the separation of soul & gender.” —Ntozake Shange, ‘For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf’ text For Colored Girls… first arrived on the scene in December…
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‘Racism Is a Soft Target’: Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright Lynn Nottage on the Prescient Moment That Became Sweat
With the endless amount of political rhetoric currently in our orbit, it’s often easy to forget about the people behind it—not just the politicians themselves, but the countless people whose fears make their power possible. It’s the grim reality we faced in 2016 when fear became the battle cry fueling the ascendancy to the presidency.…
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Black on the Great White Way: Actors Are Breaking Barriers, But Broadway Still Has a Long Way to Go On Diversity
When Brittney Johnson wore the crown as Glinda for Broadway’s Wicked earlier this month, the actress became the first black woman to portray the leading role in the heralded, long running show. Her Jan. 10 debut was a major milestone on the Great White Way because the Wizard of Oz-based musical has been one of…